Sunday, 31 January 2016

If Jesus had been politically correct, He would never have overturned the tables of the money changers and driven out all who were buying and selling in the temple in Jerusalem (Matthew 21:12).

However, He had a mission and He refused to be sidetracked by public opinion. In contrast, from an early age His overwhelming desire was to carry out His Father's mission.

Humanly speaking, this prompted Him to do things that many religious people would think were beneath the dignity of a holy prophet. Thus, He was not afraid of befriending tax collectors, some of whom were notorious for collecting more taxes than Rome had decreed, and even eating with them. Moreover, at times He associated with questionable characters that the Jewish religious leaders would curtly have dismissed as sinners.

He rejected status symbols and did not even own a home. In a culture where status symbols were as important as they are in ours, He chose to identify with the poor and the peacemakers, riding a donkey instead of a horse, when He came to Jerusalem on His final visit before the Passion that forever changed history.

He chose His inner circle of followers from among the common people: fishermen, a tax collector and others, who could hardly boast of their credentials.

When it came to observing ritual purity, for instance, by washing before a meal, and observing the Sabbath meticulously, He occasionally rejected the man-made additions to the Mosaic Law. He taught that it was more important to help the sick, the needy and the hungry even on a holy day, pointing out that people and their needs mattered more than principles, rules and traditions.

He rebuked the self-righteous who were too holy to be seen in the same room with a sinner, and even corrected His chosen disciples James and John for their selfish ambition (i.e. for graving for places of authority in the coming Kingdom).

He turned some concepts upside down. In the Parable of the Good Samaritan (Luke 10:25–37), He illustrated what the brotherhood of all men meant by making a member of a mixed-race the hero of the story.

He taught that the first would be last and the last first, and used a child as an example of how we should trust God. Moreover, He became the ultimate model of servanthood by washing His disciples’ feet.

Yet, He did not reject religious observance as such. He attended the synagogue and even accepted the Jewish ritual baptism that John the Baptist performed in the Jordan. In the Sermon on the Mount, He taught that not an iota (the Greek rendering of jod, the smallest letter in the Hebrew alphabet) would disappear from God’s Word before the end of the world:

“For I tell you truly, until heaven and earth pass away, not a single jot, not a stroke of a pen, will disappear from the Law until everything is accomplished.” (Matthew 5:18, Berean Study Bible).

He strongly endorsed the traditional view of marriage and spoke against divorce. He did not judge sinners but He did not condone sin, either. “Go and sin no more,” He told a woman caught in adultery (John 8:11).

The Gospel Jesus proclaimed differs a lot from what we think Christianity means. Instead of promising status and wealth, He told His followers that they were called to bear their cross and bury their selfish ambitions.

Saturday, 30 January 2016

Guinea pigs don’t bother much about Darwinism. Image courtesy of Laniik, public domain.

Joel Kontinen

For decades, evolutionists attempted to explain virtually everything in the animal kingdom as a result of natural selection acting on random mutations.

Recently, however, both mutations and natural selection have received some heavy flak for failing to correspond to reality. First, natural selection is not that powerful. It merely eliminates undesired traits. Second, mutations are not that random, and they cause animals to loose genetic information, leading, for instance, to blindness.

Then there’s epigenetics.

New research published in the journal Molecular Ecology suggests that guinea pigs can adapt to raising temperatures by adjusting their DNA. According to an article published in New Scientist:

“Hot stuff. For the first time, wild mammals have been seen responding to higher temperatures by altering chemical structures on their DNA. These epigenetic changes may adjust the activity of specific genes, and some are passed on to offspring.”

Alexandra Weyrich of the Leibniz Institute for Zoo and Wildlife Research in Berlin, Germany, explains:

“Evolution by genetic mutation and natural selection can be slow. But epigenetic changes that affect how genes are expressed, such as attaching methyl molecules onto DNA, are much faster and more flexible. Experiments in a type of brine shrimp and the plant Arabidopsis thaliana have shown that such heat-induced epigenetic responses can even be inherited by the next generation.”

So, while she seems to buy into the Darwinian worldview, at least to some extent, the research she published with her colleagues is anything but neo-Darwinian.

They studied South American guinea pigs. Their results seemed to indicate that at least these animals could adapt to a warmer climate. The guinea pigs showed “significantly altered methylation in at least 10 genes that seem to be linked to regulating body temperature.”

Their DNA did not change. It is not known whether the changes are inheritable, but the research nonetheless suggests that whereas the key players in Darwinian evolution, i.e. natural selection and mutations, fail to work, epigenetics runs the show.

It sounds a lot like a designed feature that was programmed into the guinea pigs from the beginning, to help them cope in different kinds of environments.

Thursday, 28 January 2016

Venus has been called our sister planet though it doesn’t look at all like Earth. It orbits the Sun in the goldilocks region or habitable zone of our solar system, but it certainly does not look like it is habitable.

This is a big mystery for those who believe in a naturalistic /materialistic explanation of the universe, the solar system and life.

Recently, New Scientist published a series of articles on these mysteries that will probably remain unsolved, as they are not willing to accept the one and only logical explanation, namely, that whereas Earth is designed for life, Venus is not.

With temperatures rising to 460 °C, the Venus landscape looks a bit like a painting by Salvador Dali:

“A dim, desolate wasteland pitted by endless sulphuric acid rain and scoured by syrupy winds whose speeds are dictated by the time – fast at dawn and dusk but slowing in the heat of the day. If the choking, largely carbon dioxide atmosphere doesn’t kill you, the heat – a lead-melting– surely will.”

The standard explanation is that Venus is too close to the Sun.

But what about Mars?

They have a somewhat similar explanation. Once again, they assume that the Sun is the culprit although one might think that it’s too far away to do much mischief.

Our solar system seems to be a rarity in the universe. The giant gas planets Jupiter and Saturn keep Earth habitable but even they are unable to seed Venus and Mars with life.

Tuesday, 26 January 2016

Many people think that the Gospels were written several decades after the eyewitnesses of the events described in them had passed away. However, if we look at the details the authors included in their accounts we will soon find a very different story.

First of all, the Gospels are about real people who lived at a particular time in history (ca. AD 30) in a certain geopolitical setting (the Roman Empire) and geographical area (i.e. the land promised to the Hebrew patriarch Abraham and his descendants).

We become familiar with the failures and even the quirks of the early Christian leaders. The chosen apostles were hardly role models. Peter was brave and impetuous. He got his feet wet and once cut off a servant’s ear. James and John, the Sons of Thunder, were no peacemakers either. Once they wanted to "call fire down from heaven" to destroy a Samaritan village that refused to welcome them (Luke 9:51-56).

The authors often included details that might sound superfluous. Mark 14: 51 mentions that when Jesus was arrested, soldiers caught a young man following Him but the man "fled naked, leaving his garment behind". Some scholars have suggested that this man was Mark himself.

And when soldiers forced Simon from Cyrene to carry Jesus' cross, Mark adds that Simon was the father of Alexander and Rufus. The only logical reason for including this detail is that the early believers for whom Mark wrote his Gospel knew who these men were.

When Jesus had washed the feet of His disciples, John mentions that Judas went out "and it was night" (John 13:30). We feel that something ominous will soon happen.

And it did. It marked the beginning of the passion of Christ that led to His death and resurrection and eventually to the birth of the Christian Church.

The disciples were disturbingly slow to learn the lessons Jesus taught them. Time and again Jesus had to rebuke them for their lack of faith. Luke 22:24 records that at the last supper, dispute arose "among them [i.e. the disciples] as to which of them was considered to be greatest."

Once, when Jesus healed ten lepers, only one of them bothered to return to thank Him. And the odd one out was a despised Samaritan (Luke 17:11-16).

It is also fascinating that in a very patriarchal society the first witnesses of Jesus' resurrection were women.

The role of women is a big challenge to those who think the Gospels were fabrications. Why would anyone choose women for this very important task?

After all, pious Jewish men used to thank God that He had not made them Gentiles (i.e. non-Jews), slaves or women.

Yet the Gospels show clearly that while the leaders Jesus Himself had chosen doubted His resurrection, some women believed.

Author Donald Kraybill wrote a book entitled The Upside-Down Kingdom. We might see the Gospels as an introduction into this Kingdom with values that differ radically from what we would expect: The first will be last, and the last first. The greatest is not the one who is served but the one who serves.

It seems that everything that was written in the Gospels serves a particular purpose. For instance, the details about Christ's mighty signs were "written that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that by believing you may have life in his name" (John 20:31).

So perhaps small details were included in the text to show that it is authentic.

Monday, 25 January 2016

"Is suicide a tragic variant of an evolutionarily adaptive set of behaviors?"

This is the title of a recent article posted on Science Daily. It seems that articles dealing with some aspects of the culture of death make headlines more often than other stories.

It summarises a paper published in Psychological Review by Thomas E. Joiner and colleagues, and at first it gives some background information:

“What do snapping shrimp, naked mole rats, ants, honeybees, and humans all have in common? They all share a similar colony-like organizational system that biologists have termed eusociality. Eusocial species have been remarkably successful in both surviving and thriving through the use of colony-level cooperation. One cooperative behavior used by all eusocial species is the self-sacrifice of individuals to defend the colony.”

They see humans as just another species among many others, prompting them to conclude: “Joiner et al. propose a framework in which suicide is viewed as a tragic variant of what typically serves as an adaptive tendency towards self-sacrifice among humans.”

“An adaptive tendency” suggests it has something to do with natural selection that is often invoked to explain all kinds of behaviour.

However, we should not forget that we have free will (although some evolutionists would see it as an illusion).

The tendency of seeing parallels between animal behaviour and that of humans is based on Darwinian evolution that basically denies the high status the Bible confers on man:

“You have made them a little lower than the angels and crowned them with glory and honor.” (Psalm 8:5, NIV).

According to the biblical worldview, all people have intrinsic value. We are made in the image of God, and Jesus Christ came to die for all human beings, regardless of their background.

That was the ultimate price God was willing to pay for you and me.

While we still see the consequences of Adam’s sin in our world, God has already solved the sin question.

His empty tomb testifies of the greatest miracle of all times: He has conquered death.

Source:

American Psychological Association. 2016. Is suicide a tragic variant of an evolutionarily adaptive set of behaviors? Science Daily (14 January).

Saturday, 23 January 2016

In 2007, assyriologist Dr Michael Jursa found the name Nebo-Sarsekim in a clay document in the British Museum. The details mentioned in the tablet written around 595 BC correspond to what the Book of Jeremiah says about the Babylonian siege of Jerusalem that took place during the reign of the Babylonian king Nebuchadnezzar II.

The document is significant, as the Babylonian official who briefly appears in Jeremiah 39:3 is a very minor character in the account, and shows the biblical author has recorded the facts correctly.

Nebo-Sarsekim was indeed present at the time of the siege, just like Jeremiah says.

Finding archaeological support for the Bible has become so commonplace that in 2014 Biblical Archaeology Review (BAR) published an article entitled Archaeology Confirms 50 Real People in the Bible.

The title is somewhat misleading, though, as it only deals with Old Testament characters. Had it included people mentioned in the New Testament, the list could have been much longer. In Jerusalem, for instance, archaeologists have dug up tons of evidence supporting the Bible’s history.

Sir William Ramsey (1852–1916) set out as a sceptic to disprove the reliability of the Bible. But the more he delved into the details of the Acts of the Apostles, the more convinced he became that Luke, its author, was a first-class historian and had recorded even small details, such as the titles of local Roman officials, correctly.

This is more impressive than it sounds, as the titles varied according to place and time and a particular title might only have been used for a brief period in history.

It appears that Luke made no mistakes.

A similar trend can be found in beliefs about the reliability of the Old Testament. The Hittites were once thought to be non-existent, until archaeologists found evidence that showed the Old Testament writers had been right.

Another fascinating detail has to do with Belshazzar and Nabonidus. In 1854 archaeologist Sir Henry Rawlinson, who was excavating at the ancient city of Ur, found an inscription, which stated that Nabonidus decreed that his eldest son Bel-shar-usur (i.e. Belshazzar) could use the royal title.

Thus, this helps us to understand why the Book of Daniel records that Belshazzar is called king (Dan. 5:1) and why he promised to make the one who could explain a terrible vision the third ruler in the kingdom (Dan. 5:7).

The Black Obelisk of Shalmaneser III, currently kept at the British Museum, includes an interesting detail: a vassal ruler prostrates himself before the Assyrian king.

This happened during the time when Hazael, King of Syria, fought against Jehu, King of Israel in the 9th century B.C. In 841 B.C Jehu obviously went to ask the Assyrian ruler to help him against Hazael. The text on the Black Obelisk says:

“The tribute of Jehu, son of Omri: I received from him silver, gold, a golden bowl, a golden vase with pointed bottom, golden tumblers, golden buckets, tin, a staff for a king [and] spears."

Omri was the name Shalmaneser III used of the royal house of Israel.

A few years ago sceptics doubted the historicity of Kind David. But then archaeologists found a 9th century B.C. inscription with the text House of David in Tel Dan in northern Galilee.

Biblical precision does not only have to do with kings, royal officials or high priests. Archaeologists tend to find ruins and old monuments in just the places where the Bible indicates they should be. In 2015 they dug up the city of Gath where the Philistine giant Goliath used to live.

Archaeology also confirms catastrophes that took place in Bible times. In 2010, Israeli archaeologists found the remains of a Philistine temple near Kiryat Gat. It bore the signs of an Old Testament time earthquake of approximately eight on the Richter scale.

The disaster, which occurred around 750 BC, is probably the one mentioned in Amos 1:1.

Geologist Dr. Steven Austin has in recent years studied seismites, i.e., sedimentary beds disturbed by seismic shaking, in the Dead Sea area in Israel and Jordan. He has noticed that the seismites show clear signs of earthquakes mentioned in the Bible, such as the one mentioned by Amos and even the quake that took place during the crucifixion of Jesus Christ.

Many other small details in the Bible suggest that it was penned by eyewitnesses, who were familiar with the times and people they described.

Thursday, 21 January 2016

In 2014, Rob and Nick Hanigan, two fossil hunting brothers, found a “201-million-year-old” dinosaur at Penarth in South Wales. The dino has now been named Dracoraptor hanigani.

Dracoraptor means 'dragon thief'. While many scientists assume that the dinos died out millions of years ago, the dragon part of the story is interesting, as Medieval stories often featured fierce fire-breathing creatures that lived at the same time as humans.

St. George and the Dragon is probably the best known of these stories.

The Old Testament book of Job describes an enormous creature called behemoth. Some writers believe that it was a hippopotamus, but it almost certainly was not.

Ancient art often depicted animals that looked very much like dinosaurs.

And the Chinese horoscope includes the dragon together with 11 other animals, all of which still live today.

So, dragons might well have been dinosaurs.

Soft tissues have often been found in dinosaur fossils. Moreover, as dinosaur bone contains radiocarbon (C-14) that cannot last over 100,000 years, it is perfectly logical to assume that dinosaurs are not millions of years old.

While evolutionists might still not see the connection between dragons and dinos – or realise that they lived at the same time – naming some creatures dragons is a step in the right direction.

Tuesday, 19 January 2016

Intelligent design is becoming increasingly obvious. So obvious that researchers are having a hard time describing genetics or biology without using the word designed.

In today’s research, Darwinese with its erroneous concepts like junk DNA seems to belong to the distant past.

A brief report issued by the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) illustrates this trend. Catherine Drennan, a professor of chemistry and biology at MIT, recently wrote a paper published in eLife with her colleagues on ribonucleotide reductase (RNR).

She describes it as being “exquisitely designed.”

The MIT report states:

“Cell survival depends on having a plentiful and balanced pool of the four chemical building blocks that make up DNA — the deoxyribonucleosides deoxyadenosine, deoxyguanosine, deoxycytidine, and thymidine, often abbreviated as A, G, C, and T. However, if too many of these components pile up, or if their usual ratio is disrupted, that can be deadly for the cell.

A new study from MIT chemists sheds light on a longstanding puzzle: how a single enzyme known as ribonucleotide reductase (RNR) generates all four of these building blocks and maintains the correct balance among them.”

While professor Drennan attempts to speculate about a plausible evolutionary origin of this enzyme, it does not work as if it were the result of Darwinian processes:

“The enzyme’s active site — the region that binds the substrate — changes shape depending on which effector molecule is bound to a distant site on the enzyme. For this enzyme, the effector molecules are deoxynucleoside trisphosphates such as deoxyadenosine triphosphate (dATP) or thymidine triphosphate (TTP).”

Once again, research shows that living beings are a lot more complicated than Mr. Darwin could ever have dreamt. They’re full of coded systems and miniature machines.

Tardigrades might be tiny – only 0.5 mm (0.020 in) long – but they are amazingly tough. They are already found in the Cambrian strata “530 million years” ago, which means that evolutionists see them as one of the oldest kinds of living fossils.

Known as water bears for their somewhat ursine appearance, they seem to thrive in extreme conditions, both cold ( -272 °C or -458 °F) and hot (150 °C or 300 °F). Moreover, they can fast ten years without even taking in water, and still survive.

Now, Japanese researchers have found another interesting fact about the tardigrades. According to BBC news:

“Scientists in Japan say a microscopic creature called a tardigrade successfully reproduced after being frozen for more than 30 years.

Researchers at the National Institute of Polar Research in Tokyo defrosted and revived two of the tiny animals, which are also known as water bears, from a batch collected in the Antarctic in 1983, The Asahi Shimbun newspaper reports. While one tardigrade died after 20 days, the other began reproducing. It laid 19 eggs, of which 14 hatched successfully.”

It’s a wonderful world, isn’t it? Makes me think about the One who designed and made this all.

Friday, 15 January 2016

Evolutionists tend to get exited when they see – or hear about – animals doing things that only humans usually do. The latest story features chacma baboons (Papio ursinus) and ring-tailed lemurs (Lemur catta) that at least occasionally live in caves.

Bats, and some blind animals, such as crabs, arachnids and salamanders, live in caves, so this should not be such a big deal.

But perhaps it’s size that matters? When big mammals like baboons and lemurs take a nap in a cave, there seems to be no end to the excitement.

"Just like us?"New Scientist asks and begins to speculate on the origin of a South African cave where a massive amount of old bones were found.

Strange things do happen. Sometimes it's a cat that adopts ducklings instead of eating them, but that not evolution, either.

Source:

Sokol, Josh. 2016. These baboons and lemurs have left the trees to live in caves. New Scientist (14 January).

Wednesday, 13 January 2016

Cyanobacteria, or blue-green algae, as they are also called, are assumed to be one of the oldest life forms on our planet. Evolutionists would believe that they appeared over “3 billion years” ago.

This means that they are evolution’s oldest living fossils.

Yet, they are anything but simple. According to an article posted on Phys.org, they

“have an ingenious system to prepare themselves for the coming daylight when it is dark by setting up a large 'antenna'. This antenna helps them capture light energy in an efficient way, while also providing protection against damage to the photosynthesis mechanism of the bacteria.”

The article goes on to say:

“This revolutionary discovery about the functioning of the antenna was made by the Laboratory of Biophysics of Wageningen University. ‘Enhancing the photosynthesis of our crops is as important as the Green Revolution has been’ says Eric Schranz, professor in Biosystematics. ‘To achieve this improvement we need new and very detailed information about the possibilities which nature provides. This new knowledge is therefore a major breakthrough.’

Once again, we see an elegant solution in nature that inspires scientists to mimic what they observe. (Read more here, here and here.)

Monday, 11 January 2016

Image courtesy of The Ohio State University Radio Observatory and the North American AstroPhysical Observatory (NAAPO), public domain.

Joel Kontinen

Science fiction and Darwinian evolution have played major roles in shaping the way many people look at the universe. There’s a tendency to assume that life mysteriously pops up almost anywhere it possibly can – without any input from a Designer.

Even brilliant minds have jumped on the alien life bandwagon. Steven Hawking, for instance, has warned earthlings of big bad aliens. Others have speculated that we have already seen them, while some others are planning to communicate with them.

What is needed is a reality check. We don’t know of any other star system expect our own that harbours life, and the search for alien intelligence (SETI) has been marked by false alarms.

The latest to go is the famous Wow! Signal. A recent article in New Scientist gives some background facts:

“On 15 August 1977, radio astronomers using the Big Ear radio telescope at Ohio State University picked up a powerful signal from space. Some believe it was our first interception of an alien broadcast.”

Hopes were high when the assumed message was first received:

“The signal – known as the “Wow! signal” after a note scribbled by astronomer Jerry Ehman, who detected it – came through at 1420 megahertz, corresponding to a wavelength of 21 centimetres. Searchers for extraterrestrial transmissions have long considered it an auspicious place to look, as it is one of the main frequencies at which atoms of hydrogen, the most common element in the universe, absorb and emit energy. What’s more, this frequency easily penetrates the atmosphere.”

However, the almost 40 years following the signal have been silent ones. Now it seems that the signal was caused by two comets that passed Earth. Antonio Paris, a professor of astronomy at St Petersburg College in Florida came up with this view recently.

He might well be right.

Source:

Emspak, Jesse. 2016. Famous Wow! signal might have been from comets, not aliens. New Scientist (11 January).

Saturday, 9 January 2016

Jesus paid the ultimate penalty for sin. In Roman times, the culture of death prevailed. It seems that the Grim Reaper is very much at home in our world, also.

Joel Kontinen

Christianity knows death as the last enemy, but some people seem to take a very different approach to the issue. ISIS fosters a culture of death in the Near East and elsewhere, just 70 years after the holocaust.

Its not so different in the western world, where organs are harvested from aborted babies, and the Grim Reaper is on the march.

Assisted suicide has become legal in Belgium, the Netherlands and Switzerland, Canada and some U.S. states, such as California.

In Belgium, there was a case in which a Dr. Death killed a non-terminal patient without informing close relatives.

Now, neighbouring Netherlands has relaxed its laws on euthanasia, so that a doctor can help patients die even “if they [are ] incapable of making their current feelings known.”

In principle, euthanasia laws are strict: “The patient must be suffering unbearable pain and the doctor must be convinced the patient is making an informed choice.”

The law also stipulates that a patient has to have “a written euthanasia request” and it requires the doctor to ask a colleague’s opinion.

However, once one lets the Grim Reaper into the ward, he tends to find loopholes for getting past existing regulations.

Thursday, 7 January 2016

Taeniolabis taoensis is probably related to the recent find. Image courtesy of Robert Bruce Horsfall (1869–1948), public domain.

Joel Kontinen

Evolutionists would not expect to find many mammal fossils in the Triassic strata, as they thought that the few mouse like creatures began diversifying in the Jurassic.

Now, research published in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences suggests that they were wrong, although the direction might be a bit of a surprise.

Charles Choi writes in Live Science:

“Three-dimensional computer models of fossils from a tiny mouse-size creature that lived about 210 million years ago in what is now Greenland clear up a long-standing mammal mystery. The high-tech analysis of the fossils suggests that mammals originated more than 30 million years more recently than previously suggested, the researchers say.

Paleontologists analyzed fossils of haramiyids, extinct relatives of modern mammals that lived about 210 million years ago.”

Live Science says that this discovery “uproots the mammal family tree”.

The problem with Darwinian trees is that they tend to follow the example of London Bridge in the children’s song, i.e. fall down. Most of them look like an orchard, something that Bible-believers have said decades ago.

Recently, we also heard about Jurassic squirrels and flowering plants that grew during the dino era.

Tuesday, 5 January 2016

The origin of flowering plants is not an abominable mystery for those who believe the Bible is true.

Joel Kontinen

Not so long ago researchers thought that dinosaurs never saw grass. But then they discovered coprolite (a technical term for fossilised dung) that showed dinos had eaten grass.

A related myth to fall is Darwin’s abominable mystery or the genesis of flowering plants. He thought it was abominable because it bothered him. Neither he nor other evolutionists expected to find the seeds of angiosperms in early Cretaceous strata.

Now, research published in Nature shows that the world of dinosaurs was anything but drab. Pines were not the only plants they saw.

The researchers analysed

“75 different angiosperm taxa recovered from rich assemblages of angiosperm flowers, fruits and seeds in 11 mesofossil floras from eastern North America and Portugal, ranging in age from Barremian-Aptian to early or middle Albian, about 125–110 million years ago.”

This is not the first time that science publications report on finding flowers, seeds or pollen that are supposedly as old as or even older than dinosaurs.

Sunday, 3 January 2016

We wouldn’t expect to find aquatic animals in the Andes, but we do. Image courtesy of NASA Earth Observatory, public domain.

Joel Kontinen

Researchers at the Case Western Reserve University reported finding the fossil of an almost 1,5 metre (5 feet) long tortoise in the Andes Mountains of southern Bolivia.

They found it on an arid plateau with no traces of water. Nevertheless, they assume that “13 million years ago” the place was much wetter.

Reporting on the find, ScienceDaily states:

“Fossilized shell pieces of a much smaller, aquatic turtle found nearby support the altitude estimate and also indicate the climate was much wetter than today.”

Cold-blooded aquatic animals cannot live high in the mountains.

The discovery fits in nicely into the Genesis perspective. Like a fossilised tropic forest in Norway, whales found on dry land and dinos in the Arctic, they show that at the time of the Flood, the world looked very different from what it does today.

Friday, 1 January 2016

In 1970, Irish schoolgirl Rosemary Brown, who used – and still uses – the name Dana, won the Eurovision song contest with a touching love song called All Kinds of Everything.

While the world has changed a lot since 1970, all kinds of everything still remind us of what should be most important for us, namely Jesus Christ.

We still count our years from His birth, although no one knows its exact time. We still see evidence of His brilliant design in the world around us. Even fireworks remind us that they have to be designed intelligently.

And the bad things we saw this new year, namely the terrorist threats in Germany and the fires in Dubai, also remind us of His Word – namely, that along with death and suffering, thorns and thistles, they are a result of the Fall.